


i was dead when i woke up this morning, and i'll be dead before the day is done

by thereisasong18



Series: it's a fine romance but it's left me so undone [2]
Category: Avatar: The Last Airbender, Avatar: The Rise of Kyoshi, Avatar: The Shadow of Kyoshi
Genre: Angst, Canon Divergent, Character Death, F/F, Pain, Post canon, just pain
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-11-07
Updated: 2020-11-07
Packaged: 2021-03-09 05:48:12
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence, Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,728
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/27429700
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/thereisasong18/pseuds/thereisasong18
Summary: How does Kyoshi deal with Rangi's death?
Relationships: Kyoshi/Rangi (Avatar)
Series: it's a fine romance but it's left me so undone [2]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/2003971
Comments: 8
Kudos: 38





	i was dead when i woke up this morning, and i'll be dead before the day is done

**Author's Note:**

> This is a continuation of a fic I wrote last month about the last time Kyoshi and Rangi say I love you, which happened to be as Rangi lay dying from an attack by my completely made up character of Chin's son Chun (just in case you don't want to go back and read the first one). Sol commented and wanted Kyoshi's fallout, and here it is! I promise i'll write a happy epilogue. It was the only way I could get my beta to actually do her job and beta it...
> 
> Title from Seven Devils by Florence and the Machine.

It was cold when Kyoshi woke. Out of habit, she stretched her arm out, searching for the warmth that usually lay only a few inches away from her. She couldn’t find it. She shut her eyes against the new reality she still couldn’t force herself to accept. She shuddered, clenching her fingers on her outstretched arm until it hurt. Her warmth was gone forever. Rangi was gone. Rangi was… dead. Tears leaked from Kyoshi’s eyes, falling down her face in a salty waterfall as she remembered the events of the last few months. Chun. The battle. Rangi. Her glowing girl.

She had had no idea how weak Rangi had become. She had done everything right, as far as she knew. Lao Ge had taught her well, how to realign the cells inside her body. How to realign them inside someone else. Kyoshi had insisted, even begged him to teach her how to do it on others, Rangi forever in the back of her mind. Lao Ge had begrudgingly agreed. It had taken her years to be confident enough in her ability to manipulate the smallest parts of someone else before she tried it on Rangi. But she had done it, and it had worked. They had lived 229 years together when Chun came to their island.

Shame washed over Kyoshi. Shame that she had failed to keep Rangi as strong as she had kept herself. Shame that she hadn’t even noticed the inner flame of her Firebender slowly petering out. The inner flame of the one whose loss she now felt so keenly. Once she had learned that Rangi’s flame was dimming, she had done her best to end the fight quickly. Maybe if she had gone into the Avatar State sooner, it would never have happened. The moment that had taken everything from her had almost felt like a dream. She hadn’t seen the knife Chun held, hadn’t reacted in time as he threw it at her side, at the only place her armor didn’t reach. She hadn’t reacted in time to stop Rangi from throwing herself in front of her, taking the knife directly to her stomach. It was like she had been moving in slow motion, trapped, watching the events play out before her and helpless to stop them.

It was like half of her had been ripped away. Every day since the the battle, she had sat up, mindlessly forcing her body to move, to work, to get out of the bed and stand. Half of her did. Half of her walked from the room each day. Half of her put on her armor; methodically applied her makeup. This was her face now. Only Rangi had seen her without makeup, the last few decades. Now, no one would ever see it again.

In the days after the battle, no one had ventured near her. Only a few Kyoshi Warriors had returned from the mainland. They found their sifu dead and sisters hurt, and Kyoshi barely able to speak, her grief weighing her down like chains. She hadn’t been able to heal them, so they had left again, back to the mainland with their wounded sisters. Kyoshi had forced them to go. They hadn’t been there to see her emerge from the wasteland the battle and her Avatar State had created. No one had seen her carrying Rangi in her arms, so delicate, so devoid of everything that made her Rangi. No one had seen the blood leaking from Rangi’s mouth, pooling in a crimson stain spreading across her stomach. No one had seen her drop to her knees just hundreds of feet from where Chun’s body lay, unable to carry Rangi any further without falling to the ground and letting her grief explode within her.

No one had seen her bury Rangi.

Kyoshi still didn’t know how she had done it. Perhaps the Avatars of lives before had stepped in, helping her with the work. All she had known was that she was losing the girl that she loved, watching dirt move and shift, forming a depression in the ground into which she had lowered the woman who had meant more to her than life itself. She had given her world to the ground. Her native element would now take care of Rangi, now that she could not. It had taken everything she had to move the first pile of earth, the first pile to cover her Firebender forever. She had held it there for what seemed like forever, in the air, unable to let it drop. She had stared into the grave for hours, holding the earth above her. Taking the last look at the love of her life. Finally, she could hold on no longer. Her strength abandoned her in as her muscles relaxed against her will, and the dirt fell from the sky, filling the deep depression. Covering Rangi forever. As soon as it smoothed and melded with the rest of the ground, Kyoshi lost whatever control she had remaining.

The Avatar’s pain almost wiped out the entire island. She had regained consciousness to find the blast radius encircling her, trees uprooted and rocks strewn around the small area that contained Kyoshi and the grave, a tiny oasis of calm in the center of the terrible devastation that filled her.

It had taken her until a day after her warriors had left the island to fulfill her next duty to her Firebender. She had sat before the stone for hours. In the back of her mind, this was where it would be final. As soon as she made a mark in the stone, it would really be over. Rangi would never speak to her again. Never roll over in the middle of the night and sling an arm across Kyoshi’s waist in her sleep again. Never wake her up at the crack of dawn for training again. Never kiss her again. Never be again.

Kyoshi had shut her eyes. Without looking, she lifted her fans, carving deep into the marker. _Rangi Sei’naka. She was the sun._ With each stroke, she felt the words being etched on her heart. She hadn’t left the grave until the next day. Each time she had looked at the stone, a fresh wave of grief had beaten her down, refusing to let her leave.

Kyoshi shook her head. It would never get any easier. Somehow, some way, she had gotten up. Somehow she had made it back to the village. Past Chun’s body, which was being picked over by sea vultures. Kyoshi had smiled grimly, the slight consolation giving her enough strength to get her back to her home.

Slowly, very slowly, she had recovered. Slowly, she had returned to her Avatar duties. But it wasn’t the same. Her entire world had revolved around Rangi, and with her gone, it was like Kyoshi was a shell of her former self. Gradually, she became less and less involved with the world. She no longer cared what the nations did, or what fights their people got into. Her warriors were doing a fine enough job. They had been trained by the best, after all. When Kyoshi sensed her body once again failing, her cells slowly dying, she let them. She had no wish to keep going, with the light in her life extinguished.

It had only been a year from the day of their battle with Chun to this day. The day Kyoshi gave up. Once her body realized it was no longer being rejuvenated, the decline was exponential, like it was making up for lost time aging. This day was no different. The aches and pains had finally caught up to her. Her hand shook as she applied her makeup. She had kept her face young, years of practice giving the control she needed to keep her hair and features from slipping. The Avatar still existed, after all. Made the occasional appearance. She had kept just enough influence that the world did not dissolve into chaos, but she knew it wouldn’t last.

Everyone believed Avatar Kyoshi was the strongest person in the world, the bridge between worlds, meting out her version of justice throughout the nations. They were wrong. The strongest person in the world had been a small, confident Firebender, and she had kept the Avatar on track for all of their days. Kyoshi simply couldn’t take any more days of existing without the partner of her heart and soul, and on the one year anniversary of the day Rangi had been taken from her, Avatar Kyoshi finally decided that her time in the world was over.

She didn’t tell anyone, of course. There were plenty of people in the world who would have leaped at the news, and plenty of people who would try to convince her to stay. It was fitting, really. The Avatar who drew attention to herself with every move she made would go out quietly, without causing any sort of disturbance, much unlike her life. And so, Kyoshi made one last trek, past the village, out to the small patch of land that had sat undisturbed for the last year from all but her. She sat down with the cool stone against her back, arranging herself in her favorite meditation position. She had not meditated for a full year. She had been terrified of reaching the Spirit World and not finding Rangi in it. But it didn’t matter, now. Nothing did. Her world was gone, and so she would leave this world too. There was no point to remaining in it anymore.

She breathed in. She breathed out. The next Avatar would be born into the Fire Nation. In her mind, she could see him, a premonition, perhaps, the spirits showing her who would next take on the burden of Avatarhood. At least once she had left this life she could train him as well as she knew how to, a fitting tribute to the Firebender who had trained her. Who had been her compass. Who had made her whole. Kyoshi breathed in and out again, but this time, she focused on Rangi’s face. It was time to let go. As she felt her presence in the material world fading, her last thought was of Rangi. The world was in someone else’s hands now. The era of Avatar Kyoshi had ended.


End file.
